Capitalizing on Lean Production Systems to Win New Business ─ Creating a Lean and Profitable New Product Portfolio

"Written for both the sales organization and the purchasing organization, this book has two primary goals. The first is to develop a method of building and writing a New Product Acquisition and Launch Portfolio so that new business can be acquired and launched in an efficient, knowledgeable way toward achieving a profit. The second goal is to expose the sales organization and the purchasing organization to the concept of a lean enterprise production system. Despite their differences, this book has been conceived to satisfy both sales and purchasing organizations in order to achieve their mutual goals"--

Chris Harris holds an MBA and a DBA with a major in management from Anderson University in Indiana. Dr. Harris is the author of numerous articles and several books on Lean production, including; Lean Supplier Development, Lean Connections - Making Information Flow Efficiently and Effectively, Developing a Lean Workforce, all published by Productivity Press and Making Materials Flow, published by the Lean Enterprise Institute which won the Shingo Research Prize for Excellence in Manufacturing Research in 2005.

Dr. Harris has worked in a number of professional positions, including as a corporate buyer, an account representative at Toyota Tsusho, a production supervisor, and as a team member on the assembly line at Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky (TMMK). His research and teaching interests focus on lean supply chain production systems. Dr. Harris teaches seminars on lean production principles and assists companies in implementing lean production systems throughout the world. Dr. Harris is currently the vice president of operations at Harris Lean Systems in South Carolina.

Rick Harris has been helping companies become Lean for the past 15 years. He has had great success helping large and small companies, union and non-union, to implement their own lean manufacturing system. HLS, Inc. has been instrumental in assisting company's world wide with major financial improvements, (a plant in New York 42 million in 4 years, a plant in Indiana 32 million in 3 years); He helps to educate executives, plant managers and plant staff in the principles of lean manufacturing Rick helps with the actual implementation on the shop floor and the education of the workforce. He has pioneered the reverse flow process to achieve an increase in efficiency of 25%. Rick has extensive experience developing new manufacturing layouts that facilitate one-piece flow, operator flexibility, operator engagement, first time through quality, optimum uptime, and reduced capital investment. Rick has also co-authored two Shingo Prize winning books Creating Continuous Flow, and Making Materials Flow published by James Womack and the Lean Enterprise Institute. Rick has also co-authored a three other books Developing A Lean Workforce, Lean Connections Making Information Flow. and Lean Supplier Development. published by Productivity Press. Rick has been one of the featured speakers at The Lean Enterprise Institute's monthly lean conference. Rick has been a speaker at the University of Michigan Lean Manufacturing Conference for the past 7 years, The Lean Enterprise Institute Summit for the past 3 years, The European Lean Enterprise Institute Summit, The Maynard Forum, The PERA Conference, The Mississippi State Annual Lean Conference the past 2 years, European AME Conference, the AME Conference in Chicago 2002, The University of Kentucky Lean Leadership Forum the past 3 years, and the Lean Summit Brazil 2004.